Last of the Valerii
An American painter in Rome watches his god-daughter Martha marry into the ancient and crumbling Valerio family, her American fortune breathing new life into their decayed villa. When excavations uncover a radiant marble statue of Juno, Martha triumphs in her passion for archaeology. But her husband Prince Marco reacts with a disturbance that transcends mere aesthetic admiration: he becomes consumed, haunted, perhaps possessed by something the statue has awakened. James weaves a psychological chill through the corridors of old Rome, where American optimism collides with European decay and something far more sinister stirs in the earth. Is the supernatural real here, or simply the logical extension of a man undone by jealousy, history, and the weight of his own lineage? The answer is more unsettling than any ghost story convention. This is James at his most atmospheric, mining the uncanny from the collision of cultures and the danger of awakening the past.
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